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INCLAIR
Douglas Gilbert, a personal friend of the famous novelist who won the Nobel Prize in Literature, compares him with the star of his choice in this keenly analytical article. Does Sinclair Lewis choose Katharine Hepburn as the finest star because she is his spiritual twin?
By
DOUGLAS
GILBERT
In Sir James Barrie's whimsical "Little Minister," Katharine reaches new heights.
. Again, in "The Little Minister."
THE great American three-ringed circus has been the interest of Sinclair Lewis. He has paid little attention, beyond endorsing its checks, to Hollywood's show or its artists. Now it can be printed that Mr. Lewis chooses as the finest artist of the American screen — Katharine Hepburn. This is more than news — it is a piece for the NEW New Movie.
Here is his reason for selecting Miss Hepburn: "She has rhythm, she moves, there is a mobility about her that is as constant as the flow of a river. She has poise that is arresting. She is never, as so many of the screen stars are, static."
Frankly, I was astonished at his choice. The lean and leggy Kate never meant any more to me than a forehead (like a proscenium) , a mouth and a pair of stilts. But she is Mr. Lewis' screen girl and that's something. Let's see if we can find what that something is.
Now Mr. Lewis is America's best known, if you will not admit (as I do), greatest
author, and a pageant of women have crossed his pages leaping out at you, say, with all the vitality of Ann Vickers. Maybe this is the tie-up, the reason for his choice, for Miss Hepburn has vitality, albeit of the shot-in-the-arm kind.
I will not admit, however, that it is the real reason; to determine that you have to consider factors in the characteristics of both. Let's run the pair of them down and see how closely Tomboy Katie, of Hartford, compares with the gangling, explosive "Red" of Sauk Center.
Consider Kate's career. Does she really mean, actually deserve, the box-office plaudits she has won ? Does she merit the distinction Mr. Lewis has laid on her towseled head? Only a few years ago she was the leading door-bell ringer of Broadway, a pest to the casting agents and a nuisance to producers. She was trying to get a job — a stage-struck gal from Connecticut.
Finally she landed as an understudy to Hope Williams — as sure an instance of cast
ing to type as the Broadway lads have ever exhibited. But Katharine's Hope never materialized. Miss Williams never got sick. And Miss Hepburn languished in the wings shifting her shoulder straps in uneasy futility.
I think Broadway, and of course when I say Broadway I mean the legitimate stage, was always a little frightened of her. There is a neurotic stimulation about her that is incoherently violent. She is a network of haywires, livid as a flickering Neon light that has something wrong with its gadgets.
But she can take it. That's what the gals like about her, and the men too, and Mr. Lewis. Although I am no stickler for her art I salute her for her courage. The weary round of steps she trekked to land a part have been as torturing as the beatings she has taken from the critics. They called her "immature" and "over-emphatic."
This has been her cross. She's carried it like a man. Last season she opened in an
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The Neiv Movie Magazine, Jawiary, 19 35